Russian Bears v’s Kiwis at Rogaining World Champs
Rob Howard/Bill Kennedy / 18.11.2010
It is all change among the leading pairings at this year’s Rogaining World Championships, which takes place this weekend in Cheviot, New Zealand, and the competition looks set to a strong one with successful Russian racers and the kiwis on their home territory.<P>
The current World Champions are Evgeny Dombrovskiy and Pavel Shestakov from Russia but Shestakov is not racing this time around and Dombrovskiy will be competing with Dmitry Erokhin. It will be interesting to see how the new Russian pairing fare in defending the title.<p>
2nd place getters in last World Champs in Australia were the New Zealanders Dennis de Monchy and Chris Forne. Again the pairings have changed and this year Forne running with Marcel Hagener, another well-known adventure racer, while Dennis is paired with Australian, Richard Mountstephens.
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3rd place at the last champs were the Russians Oleg Kalinin and Sergey Yashchenko. Oleg is running with a new team mate Mikhail Mokeykin (Russia), while Sergey Yashchenko is teamed with Evgeny Gavrilov this time, both from Russia.
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The current NZ Champions (2010) are Jamie Stewart (Wellington) and Greig Hamilton (Canterbury). a competition in which Phil Wood and Nathan Fa'ave were runners-up. Fa’ave is not competing at the World Champs so Wood has paired up with Bruce McLeod, while Hamiltion has also had to find a new partner as Stewart is injured. He is running with Phil Novis.<p>
The competition area is on South Island 120km from Christchurch and is mostly on private farmland with rolling hills and spurs and gully terrain. Coastal hills to the east rise to a maximum of 423 m on Mt. Beautiful. A number of 300 m saddles provide easier access to the coast, and south of Cheviot the hills are easier, rising to between 120 and 200 m. The surrounding hills to the west vary between 200 and 300 m. A number of minor roads and farm tracks exist, but for the most part, travel will be cross-country rather than road or track walking.<P>
Teams are registering this Friday and the competition will run from midday on Saturday to midday on Sunday, with pairs scoring points from visiting any of the 93 checkpoints, which are all pre-marked on 1;40,000 maps with 20m contour intervals. They can return to the Hash House base at any time for food and rest but the leaders will surely make the most of their 24 hours, aiming to return finish with the highest points total and take the title.
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